The present disclosure generally relates to structures and methods for absorbing broadband electromagnetic waves using graphene, and more particularly, to methods and structures of graphene sheets configured to absorb the broadband electromagnetic waves at the microwave and terahertz frequencies being emitted from a electromagnetic wave generating source.
The development of broadband absorption materials at the microwave and terahertz spectrum range is currently being investigated for numerous commercial and military applications. For example, terahertz radar systems are capable of probing the detailed structure of targets on a sub-millimeter scale while being able to distinguish between materials in terms of the spectral dependence of absorption. For military applications, weapons or personnel could be detected through catalogue or thin foliage and targets discriminated from background on the basis of spectral response. The use of broadband absorption materials that completely absorb the incident electromagnetic waves of interest, e.g., the terahertz frequencies, such that no transmission and reflection occurs can be used to effectively hide the target. However, most known material systems for such purposes rely on resonance peaks in the absorption spectrum and as such, a broadband solution is still lacking.